


only heaven I'll be sent to

by goodxgirl92



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Alternate Universe - Greco-Roman Mythology, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Angst, Character Death, Goddess/Angel AU, Greek and Roman Mythology - Freeform, Infidelity, It's a Reincarnation AU, Juno is a Goddess, Jupiter is a dick, M/M, Pluto is doing his best, Roman Myths, Romance, Star-crossed, Temporary Character Death, peter is an angel, they are in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-16
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2019-02-15 13:36:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13032258
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodxgirl92/pseuds/goodxgirl92
Summary: He knows that this is impossible.A goddess and an angel? It is just one of those things that can never be and Juno knows that every time he loses himself in Peter's arms.There's too much ready and willing to tear them apart at a moment's notice. The King of the Gods, the Heavenly Host and the Fall that waits for Peter, inching closer with every embrace.That doesn't stop him from wanting it.That doesn't make the ending any easier.





	only heaven I'll be sent to

**Author's Note:**

  * For [type_here](https://archiveofourown.org/users/type_here/gifts).



> This serves as a sort of... prologue to the reincarnation AU I've got knocking around. The first life, the thing that kicked everything off. Could also be taken as a stand-alone, I'm seeing where it all goes. 
> 
> Thanks to my tpp discord friends for encouraging this!

His lips pressed against his hand, up his arm. 

They can not have this. He knows that he can not have this. The wings on his back, the crown on his head should be plenty to keep them apart. Should be dictates of a higher order that they can not break. He knows what will come of this, the only ending this can have but as Peter's lips met his like gossamer silk the punch of want in his gut is a tide he cannot turn away from. 

"Juno, Juno, Juno" Peter's wings ruffle the air, cooling Juno's glowing skin. His name has never sounded sweeter, never sounded more like benediction then in the mouth of this angel. "My goddess, my love, my darling, my only." 

This is  _ blasphemy _ but Juno doesn't care.

Peter doesn’t care either. He had found a new altar to worship at, new hymns and devotion between the apex of his thighs. He was going to Fall for it but it would be a wondrous descent, driving the voice of this goddess to new and frightening heights.

"Peter" He sighed, letting his legs wrap around Peter's waist, his fingers fisting in downy soft feathers that he knew could turn steel sharp in a single breath. "Peter, please" Juno's voice is desperate, deft fingers working him open. He can feel Peter's smile against his skin. 

"Patience my darling." He murmured, teeth biting pinpricks of sweet pleasure-pain into the side of his neck, kissing the marks he left even as they faded away. Juno's voice began to climb like the choirs that sang his praises in temples, cries thick with pleasure as Peter found the spot that made him swear, made him create the heavens and the skies anew, stars bursting behind his eyelids like supernovas. 

Peter's smile was beatific, relishing every word, every noise that fell from Juno's lips; new gospels to imprint upon his soul, slowly removing his fingers and kissing away the noise that Juno made, clenching around empty air and thrusting into his lap for friction. "My darling  _ goddess _ " He whispered, sliding inside of him as his cries grew even louder. "Queen of the heavens, queen of my  **_heart_ ** ." His voice cracked slightly over the last word. 

"Your queen." Juno said in a broken voice, half mad with pleasure. "Your goddess, yours, yours, yours Peter" 

The bang of the door to his private quarters interrupts. "His?" Jupiter's voice was cold and cruel, even the distant birds falling silent. His peacocks had disappeared from the garden and he should have known. Juno's fingers dug into Peter's back, trying to pull him in closer as the air started to spark with the scent of ozone, crackles of thunder in the air. "You're his?" 

His voice is rage and the storm. 

Peter's wings stiffen, silk to steel and they curve around them to try and protect him from the Thunderer, Peter's face a cold mask as he looked at Jupiter and slowly turned, short sword pulling out of the air in a single gesture. 

“Yes.” Juno said, his face numb. “What do you care?” He asked, hand placed on Peter’s heart. “You have enough of your….” His face contorted up, looking at him. He waved a hand. “Your ‘amusements’.” 

Jupiter stepped forward, lightning coming to his hand like a sword. “I am a  **king** . You are my queen and I will not be disrespected in my home.” He raised the sword up, obviously intent on Peter. “Not with this… this… borderline fallen servant!” He looked at Juno, disgust in his eyes. “How dare you let him touch you?” 

He aimed his sword, the Master Bolt at Peter and Juno’s heart leapt into his throat and he wants to scream, wants to lash out with falling stars and eternal suffering, rage and curses. Their swords clashed with a brilliant flare of light, Holy Steel versus plasma and divine rage. Juno stood, his temper swirling. 

“How  _ dare _ I?” Juno hissed, grabbing for Jupiter’s toga. “You parade your amusements before me like prize trophies, shove your bastards in my face and expect me to warm your bed at night,  _ longing _ for you like a moon-eyed child, ever loyal. You call me your queen and offer me no respect!” His hair stood on end, charged by the static electricity in the room. “So yes.” He said, letting his voice drop a couple of octaves as he put himself between Peter and Jupiter. “I let him  _ touch _ me.” His other hand trailed over his own body, over the marks he allowed to glory there, the bruises of tender, loving bites over his collarbones, down his chest and between his thighs. “He  _ worships _ me. He loves me.” There is soft awe in his voice at that. 

He is a goddess and the love that Peter offered him so freely, love that is supposed to be offered only in supplication to that distant Lord that is his Father, his Creator feels like the sweetest of ambrosia and he drinks it down like a wanderer in a desert. 

Worship and love are different feelings, different emotions entirely and Juno had not known how starved he was for the latter, how lacking it had been until he had found it in Peter’s arms, had found himself returning it like a spilling fountain, so overfull with an emotion so strong and new that it felt as if it was coming out of every pore. As if he has been born anew. 

Jupiter’s face darkened like a thundercloud. “You are mine” He hissed. “I am Father of the Skies, King of the Gods.” The Master Bolt crackled in his hands like a threat. “I will not be defied!” 

Juno’s eyes harden and cool as he shoves him. 

Jupiter may be King of the Gods, the Sky Father. May be his husband, wielder of the Master Bolt. But Juno is the Queen. Not just of the Gods, but of the Heavens themselves. 

Stars are born in the whisper of his breath, galaxies dance in the swirling of fingertips. He has sent the buzzing flies, chased succor from those who had angered him, cursed and blessed in equal measure. “I let him touch me.” He said, glaring into Jupiter’s rage darkened eyes with ones that swirled like the night sky. “And how he  _ touches _ me my King.” It is a taunt, cruel and bright. He can feel the rustle of Peter’s wings behind him, knows that his sword is raised to defend him even as Juno defends him. “Shall I tell you of how he fucks me?” Juno asked, his grin bright and taunting. “I could dedicate the best poets to the task of his talents and not one would come close to the pleasures he has given me. A whole host of muses could not inspire as he inspires me.” 

It's not the smartest idea he’s ever had. He wants to turn his head, to tell Peter to run, to fly back to his heavenly garrison while he distracts him but he cannot. 

And Peter… will not run. 

Juno remembered whispered promises in his ear, Peter standing next to his throne while Jupiter chased off the latest beautiful mortal or nymph, the only witness to his companion Ganymede. 

He remembered the whispers, the hope in his chest warring with the knowledge that it is not possible. Peter’s promises to whisk them both away, off into the distant stars far away from the Heavenly Hosts of his Creator, far away from the heights of Mt. Olympus. 

It was impossible and wonderful and all Juno wants to do is flee. To walk in starlight to distant planets where it is only he and Peter…. But it is not to be. 

Jupiter’s rage is building like a living thing, the sky outside darkening to pitch.

Juno remembered the feeling of starfire in his hands, the heat of celestial forges giving birth to the universe and he looked at the rage in his husband’s eyes. Remembered the hot shame in his stomach, the anger and desperate frustration each time a new demi-god was presented to the court. Each time a new divinity came to court to name him as ‘father’ and he was expected to greet them with a smile, watch as Juventas poured ambrosia in their cups. 

There is a deep rage in him as well and it is not the flash of lightning then the thunder. 

It is creeping and rooted within the ivory marble of this golden palace. In every moment of quiet humiliation, every screaming match and drag out brawl that shakes the young Earth to its foundations. How much has Jupiter taken from him in the years since he overthrew Saturn? 

Juno’s spine is star-iron, forged in the heart of the hottest stars. “I have never known such pleasures before.” He hissed, taking pleasure in the jab to Jupiter’s ego. “I love him.” The words taste like victory in his mouth. “I love him as I will  _ never _ love you.” 

He roared and lashed out and the lightning burned through god flesh like a flame did paper. It did not kill him but it burned and Juno could not help the scream that burst from his throat. So few things can hurt them that they do not allow to and the pain sent him to his knees, flesh scarring over, still glowing with heat. It crackles through his veins and he is in so much  **pain** that he almost doesn’t hear Peter’s sword clattering to the ground as his angel, his  _ angel _ runs forward to catch him. 

He does hear it though. Just as he hears the crackle of the Master Bolt as Jupiter lowered it before Peter’s face. “Get away from him.” Jupiter’s voice is the rumble of distant thunder and Peter’s hands are the gentlest of summer rains on the burning heat of Juno’s injury that bubbles and cracks like molten rock. 

His lips are dry and cracked and the burning of the lightning in his veins spreads across his body. He won’t die but only one thing will soothe the pain, stop it. 

Juno wants to cry for Juventas but knows suddenly that even a moment of turning his head will be the moment Jupiter needs to destroy Peter. Wings are no protection against the lightning, against the scissors of the Moirai and he can see it in Jupiter’s eyes that he is waiting for Juno’s attention to snap. For him to falter in shielding Peter with his body. 

The truth must occur to Peter as well. 

“Juno… Juno you idiot.” His voice is a broken whisper, his wings curling around them both like a shield. His tears fall from his face and Juno forced himself to turn. “You idiot.” Peter whispered again, his face wet. His tears glow from within and Juno wiped them away with a trembling hand, trying to smile through the pain. 

He isn’t doing a good job of it by the look on Peter’s face. “Just… a flesh wound. Graze really.” He managed to croak out. “I’ll be fine.” Juno tried to smile again but he gasped instead, pain running through him like another bolt. “Don’t worry you… featherbrain.” 

Peter is weeping and Juno doesn’t know how to make him stop. “I’m sorry.” He said, the words foreign on his tongue. Goddess’s don’t apologize but Peter… Peter deserved this. “I knew… We knew that this couldn’t…. Arghhhh!” He gasped again, the pain sharper as his body tried to curl up around the injury. His breath is coming in harsh pants and the Master Bolt crackled, so close to Peter’s face that it started to redden and blister. 

He doesn’t flinch, angels are taught to master pain, to ignore it. They are soldiers after all but the anger at seeing Peter’s face blister gives Juno enough energy to straighten, to turn furious eyes on Jupiter and fight through his own. 

He cannot stand but he does not have to. 

“Touch him.” Juno grit out, tasting ichor in his mouth. “And be cursed.” The fury in his bones is the best pain relief he can manage. 

Jupiter laughed. Juno used it to pull himself up, up from his knees, forcing one trembling leg under then another. “What can you do to me my queen?” He seemed genuinely baffled. Like he had forgotten every time he had roused his rage, his ire in the past. Perhaps he had. Juno would not be surprised to know his husband cared not for his amusements or his bastards any further than the pleasure and glory they brought him. 

He had been turning his rage on the wrong targets. 

He could regret that later. 

“I curse you.” Juno began, the pain still shooting through every limb but his fury is stronger. The feeling of Peter behind him, next to him and the knowledge that if he should quake that Peter would catch him is a heady sort of power. “To be forgotten. To be turned from every door, never recognized. To know the  _ shame _ you have made me feel since the day you married me. For all those beauties that you sampled like fine wines to laugh in your face. To fall, fall from your lofty throne.” The words crackle with power as he speaks them. “If you touch a hair on his head then you will fall. Mt. Olympus will fall.” 

He was still laughing but Juno spit and sealed his words with the liquid fire of ichor burning on the marble floor. “Harm him.” Juno said, “and  **_fall_ ** . Fall so far you will never rise again.” 

“You wouldn’t.” Jupiter said, all confidence, stepping over the burning spot of golden god blood on the floor. “It is your kingdom too my queen.” He smiled, safe in his belief that their shared throne is enough to stay his hand, like the curse has not already been cast, the terms already accepted. 

He does not know that Juno would burn this palace, this  _ place  _ to the ground, ashes to drift down to the Underworld and Pluto below for Peter. He needs no grand chambers, just this angel whose presence is the only thing keeping him on his feet. 

Juno laughed in his face and gasped, choking on the pain. Peter’s hands are gentle as they wrap around him; coaxing him back to sit on the kline, his wings bristling like a shield. 

He knelt beside him, raised one of Juno’s hands to his lips and kissed it. “Juventas.” Juno whispered. “I need… ambrosia.” It was the only thing that would stop the pain and Jupiter has fallen silent. It's too hard to think about him as the lightning continues to run through his body like the worst torture. His muscles twitch against his will and he shuddered. Peter nodded, a hand reaching up to caress his face and Juno leaned into it, his eyes closing slowly as Peter stood, intent on summoning the cupbearer. 

The flash of light is so bright that Peter’s silhouette is burned into his eyes. If Juno closes them he can still see the Master Bolt lodging itself through Peter’s back. 

His knees crumple; falling forward, reaching for Juno as he collapsed. 

He was wrong. 

This. This was. Was. He can’t think. His world has stopped. 

Juno stared at him in silent horror. “Juventas!” He finally screamed. “Ambrosia, ambrosia!” He doesn’t know what it will do to Peter but he is still moving, he’s still moving there is still hope and Jupiter left the  **_coward!_ ** as Juno tried to pick Peter up, tried to cradle him in his arms as Juventas came running and gasped, carrying the pitcher and cups of nectar. “Help! Please, please Juventas!” He begged, trying to get Peter on to his lap as his traitorous body shuddered and jerked. 

“My Queen!” She whispered, trying to press a cup into his hands but they shook and he pressed the cup towards Peter’s mouth. “My Queen, you’re hurt.” Juventas sounded like she was weeping but Juno didn’t have the energy to care about that. 

He pressed the cup to Peter’s lips with shaking hands, the liquid gold wetting and pooling on them. Peter’s eyes fluttered and his mouth parted slightly. 

“Yes,” Juno nearly wept as Juventas tried to pour the ambrosia into his own mouth. Covered him with a sheet that fell over his shoulders like freshly fallen snow. “You’ll be alright, just drink, drink” He tilted the cup, more dripping into Peter’s mouth. “Peter, you’ll be alright.” He had to be alright, he had to be. “Just drink, drink and…” He swallowed, heart in his throat. The ambrosia is washing away his pain like dust in the rain and Peter looked up at him. “We’re… we’re going to be fine.” He almost doesn’t believe it. “We’ll run away. So far away from here.” 

Olympus will crumble behind them and Juno doesn’t care. He feels so free as more ambrosia drips into Peter’s beautiful mouth. 

They can leave. They can leave. His hand, stronger now stroked Peter’s cheek. 

He’s so… Peter is usually so warm to the touch. An embrace that he can lose himself in and Peter turned his face into Juno’s hand, his eyes smiling. He’s cold. Why is he cold? 

“Peter, you need to drink.” He looked at Juventas who at the quiet command in his eyes poured more into the cup but Peter slowly pulled away from the cup, shaking his head slowly. “Please, Peter please drink. It will restore you.” 

That was what ambrosia was for.

His smile was sad as he looked up at Juno. “My love…” His voice was soft. “I’m sorry.” His wings flapped lightly, starting to slacken behind him. “I never meant to….” His eyes closed and fought to open again as he slowly reached up to Juno’s face. “Juno… Juno I promise… I won’t break another so… listen.” He smiled and Juno shook his head. 

“No. Just, just drink a little more.” Juno said, gripping the cup tighter. “You-you just need a little more.” He had to believe that. 

Peter is looking at him and Juno covered his hand with his own, pressing it against his cheek. “Listen.” He said again. “Nothing… nothing will keep me from you Juno.” His smile was so peaceful. “Not time… not distance… not death.” He can feel the strength in Peter’s body starting to wane, wings splayed out on the floor limply. “I… I will come back to you. I will  _ always _ come back to you.” 

Juno’s lap is wet with blood. 

Some distant part of him can hear the curse settling like the bedrock of the earth, immutable and unchangeable. Juventas turned but she didn’t seem to hear what he heard. Her eyes are bright.

“Don’t talk like that.” Juno whispered. “You… you’re going to be fine.” The words feel hollow on his tongue. 

Peter just smiled at him. “Juno… please.. Before…” His voice is softer, each word a fight. “One last kiss?” His eyes are bright as he looked at him. 

And Juno… Juno has never been able to deny him. 

His lips are still like silk and Juno swallowed his last breath with a sob as Peter went limp in his arms. “Peter.” He whispered, slowly breaking from the kiss. “ _ Peter?”  _ He doesn’t answer. 

Juno screamed and the heavens opened up.

* * *

 

He felt so cold sitting here, Peter’s blood drying on his skin but when Juventas tried to move him he had started screaming again and after that she had left him alone, the overturned cup fallen on the marble floor. 

Juno knows he could sit like this until the sun expanded and consumed the planet in celestial fire and still not be any warmer even as the flames enveloped him. 

All the warmth in this world had disappeared with Peter. 

His hands caressed his face, as if his touches could restore the angel to life but that is not within his powers. For hours he had sat here silently but his lips began to move again. 

“You have no reason to listen to me.” He said, his voice barely audible but those who belonged to the One God said that He could hear prayers in His name from anywhere. Juno did not know what to do with this. He could hear the prayers invoked in his name but he had never called upon another before. “But he’s yours.” He wants to hold Peter’s lifeless body to his chest and deny him to the world, deny the world this one thing to keep forever as his own but if Peter’s Father could breath the life back into him… 

Juno could be selfless for a world that still had his angel in it. Could toss his crown at the One God’s feet and beg, prostrate himself in a way he has never allowed himself to do. 

“Please. Please, for him.” He turned his face upward, looking for some sign. “I love him.” He had never said it enough when Peter had been alive. “He’s your son isn’t he?” The skies cry for him on the earth below and distant galaxies rip themselves apart. “Please. Bring him back. He can’t be dead. Don’t let him be dead.” 

There was no answer and… Juno didn’t know why he expected one. 

Juno had not been the only one defying the laws of their worlds to find himself in Peter’s arms. He had seen the tattering of his wings, chunks of feathers ripped out of his wings and a defiant weariness in his brow when he returned from the Host. Remembered grooming misaligned feathers as Peter laughed that one day he would not be able to return to his brothers and sisters at all.  _ “If I must be Forsaken,” _ He had laughed, kissing away the furrow of Juno’s brow.  _ “Then let it be for you.”  _

Why would Peter’s Creator help him when he had turned his back on him to be in Juno’s arms? When he had put down his blade to embrace him and to die at the hands of a cruel and jealous god? 

Juno shook, hand still caressing the soft planes of Peter’s face but it is as cool as ivory, unforgiving as stone without the light that had once shone so brightly from his face. 

Slowly, Juno forced himself to stand; Peter cradled in his arms and his wings trailing down on to the ground below. If the One God will not save Peter then He cannot have him. Juno laid him down carefully on the kline that they had been embraced upon only hours earlier and retrieved a robe to cover himself. Dark as the night sky, fathomless stars winking in and out over wool and silk so fine that the weave cannot be seen. 

He does not care about the blood covering his body, golden ichor mixed with the copper tang of an angel’s blood.

He is gentle as he picked Peter back up, the majestic purple stole covering him from a chill he cannot feel as Juno began to climb down from the palace, down Mt. Olympus. His arms do not ache. His body does not tire even as he descends into the pouring rain, the skies weeping where he cannot. He walks down. 

Down. 

Down. 

Down. 

Far below Mt. Olympus, far below the city beyond it until he came to the Gates of the Underworld. He almost walked directly into the River when the ferryman stopped him, hand outstretched for payment and Juno stared at him. “Two obols.” Charon said, his eyes blank as he looked at Juno and what was in his arms. 

The coins dropped in his hands and Charon slid them into his robe, moving to the side to let Juno step onto the boat.

There is no elegance here. Just a boat as Charon pushes them away from the shore. Juno can hear the cries in the river below, souls peering up at him and seeing the divine radiance instead of the dry-eyed grief that he has resigned himself to. The angel in his arms received no notice. He is not deaf to the cries of his deceased worshippers but… there is nothing he can do for them in death. 

Pluto waited for them on the other side of the river, stoic as always as Juno stepped off, ignoring the offered hand. His face is cool, collected but he looked at Peter, theen at Juno. 

“There is nothing I can do for him.” He said, as close to apologetic as he could manage. “His soul is not mine to touch.” 

It settled like a stone within him. “He is forsaken.” Juno said, looking down at Peter. He looked like he could be sleeping but for the gray cast his face has taken, worse in the dim light of the Underworld. “Who’s is it to touch then?”

Pluto’s cool grey stare settled on his face. “It is not my power.” Juno said. “I can’t bring him back.” And he wants to rip out his own beating heart to do it. “I have no power over death.” 

“And I have none over rebirth.” Pluto answered. “Do you wish him to walk the Elysium Fields? To see that his afterlife is comfortable?” Paradise. Yes, that is what Peter deserved. To place his soul where he can know comfort and plenty and Juno almost nodded, almost said yes. That is where they would go. But Pluto had not said ‘they’. Had not said that Juno could…. 

Few Gods could walk the Underworld and all had duties to this place. 

He looked at Juno. “It is not the place of the gods to linger in the afterlife.” He was not unkind in his words, only truthful. “We are immortal; we do not die and Elysium is for the dead.” He took a step closer, the hand on his shoulder cold and intended to be comforting. “You belong in the sky Juno. Not below the earth, not where no life, no youth and splendour delights.” 

What life, Juno wanted to ask. What youth and splendour? 

All of that laid dead in his arms. He could remember what those things felt like, his hands running through Peter’s hair, the ecstasy that he found with his head thrown back, worshipping his body as he was worshipped, finding rapture and peace and  _ delight _ with him but all of that… all of that was dead and  **gone** and Pluto thought to tell him that those things could be found above? Could be found in a world that spun on without Peter in it?

How could he understand? How could he understand when he had the love of his wife, his Queen who even now waited impatiently for the turning of the seasons, for the first harvest so she could return to his arms when Juno’s lover laid cold in his? 

It wasn’t  **_fair._ **

He looked at him and Juno was not sure what Pluto saw there that made him remove his hand from his shoulder. “Olympus will fall.” Juno said like he was commenting on the weather. “All of it cast to ruin and memory.” 

Juno can feel the magic beginning to creep in the air, the curse taking deeper roots. Nothing can stop it now. If any of them would walk out of this it would be Pluto and Neptune, their realms cast separate from Olympus and the heavens. Pluto stared at him like he spoke in tongues. “If I cannot be with him as a goddess,” Juno said, his crown heavy upon his head. “Then so be it.” 

What use did he have for a crown? 

He stepped forward, deeper into the Underworld. The stone is worn smooth from millions of feet walking over it but Juno does not feel it. Pluto followed after him, making some attempt to be an escort. Juno does not feel the cold of this place seeping into his skin, into his bones. He is already so cold. What are a few more degrees? 

“What are you going to do?” Pluto’s voice isn’t fearful but there is a note of wariness to it, like he does not know what to expect from Juno. 

Which is fair. Juno does not know what to expect from himself either at this point. 

He stared ahead as they came out to the front hall of Pluto’s palace, all black marble and inlaid gemstones. The riches of the earth; he is the God of Wealth as well after all. Golden hourglasses line the wall. Juno wasn’t sure exactly of their purpose but they were behind glass and could be seen from anywhere in the front room. There was a balcony that looked down and out onto the Underworld itself. 

The golden glow of Elysium, the endless fields of Asphodel and the angry glow of Tartarus in the distance and between them all the five rivers of the Underworld. Acheron of Woe, Lamenting Cocytus, Phlegethon that Burned, Styx by which all Oaths were sworn and… sweet Lethe to forget. Juno swallowed, staring at the rivers that disappeared off into the horizon. 

“Do you want to put him down?” 

A quiet, ghostly servant gestured to another kline when Pluto spoke but Juno shook his head. “Your Majesty,” The servant murmured. “He will not be touched.” 

Juno trusted them to be honorable but… he doesn’t want to put him down. He hadn’t wanted to even to get dressed in his own chambers and he wants to even less here. 

In his arms nothing can hurt him. Peter is his and so still and cold in his arms but the idea of putting him down, letting him go made him want to tear himself apart. In his arms he can pretend. He can pretend that he is going to wake up, touch his face again. Kiss him. 

He can’t do it forever. But he can do it a little longer. 

Juno shook his head, holding Peter a little tighter to his body The warmth of his skin does nothing to him but Juno can feel the cold seeping into him. It isn’t a physical thing, not a physical cold. “No. I am fine.” 

He must make quite the picture. He can feel the blood that has dried on his face, knows the gaping wound in Peter’s stomach has soaked the stole he had wrapped him in turning purple fabric black but he has walked battlefields wrapped in goatskin and fury, clothed himself in starlight and the spinning of planets and galaxies without a thought of how he looked and he just doesn’t care anymore. 

“Juno.” Pluto’s voice is steady and Juno made a noise to indicate that he had heard him. “Does my brother know where you have gone?” He was looking at Peter’s body and Juno… 

The chuckle leaving his throat is not kind or amused. It is something else. 

“I don’t care about him.” Juno said, still staring out at the Underworld, at the rivers. “He will have… much more to concern himself with soon enough.” 

Behind him Pluto closed his eyes. “How long?” 

He didn’t know and he gave a shrug. “It took him time to die.” Juno said, leaning down to rest his forehead against Peter’s. “It will take time for him to fall. He won’t die.” His eyes closed, he breathed in and tried to pretend. 

**_“But he’ll wish he did.”_ **

That was an oath he would swear on the Styx.

There are so many things hanging in the air at that moment and Pluto’s presence is a hot iron against Juno’s nerves. He wants… he wants… 

What he wants is for Peter’s chest to rise again. For color to come to his cheeks and his eyes to open. He wanted to hear his name from his lips whispered like the sweetest of prayers. To be held in his arms, wrapped in the gentle shadow of his wings. 

But in the absence of that he wanted to be alone. To wrap himself around Peter’s body, listen for a heart that won’t beat but Pluto won’t give him that and he wanted to lash out against him for it.

“What will you do?” He asked and slowly Juno raised his head and made himself turn to look at him. Pluto’s face is as cool as the marble statues in his likeness but his eyes are kind. If he had a free hand he would scratch the kindness in them out. 

Where is he to be kind? Where was his kindness when Jupiter was humiliating him before the entire pantheon? Where was it when Jupiter’s anger broke like a thunderstorm, when Peter, Peter had died? The others had watched, had known Jupiter and done nothing. Only Vesta had offered what comfort she could, had let him cry until he had sworn that Jupiter would never see any more of his pain, never see him cry again. 

He wished that he could cry. 

The skies would for him but it wasn’t the same. He wished he could weep for him but all he could do was hold him. “I….” Juno let himself trail off. “I-I want to see him again.” He cupped Peter’s cheek and almost smiled. “He promised he would find me.” He paused. “No matter what.” 

No matter time, distance, or space. He would find him again. 

Juno turned to look at Pluto. “How is one reborn?”

He asked it like a child’s question, an innocent query and it surprises Pluto enough that he began to answer. “Souls that wish to be reborn walk the River Lethe to its end. When they reach the mouth they rejoin the Great Forge and they are…” Pluto paused. “Juno, you can’t be. No.” He shook his head. “You’re a goddess. You do not enter the path of Reincarnation.” He walked over to him and looked him in the eye. “You would lose your immortality. Your memories, your divinity. You would be  **mortal** .” This seemed to distress him. “You would have no guarantee to find him again. Even if he promised there are no….” 

“Do I look like I care about my divinity?” Juno asked coldly. He reached up into his hair and removed his crown and passed it to Pluto. “For Proserpine.” Juno almost laughed at the gobsmacked look on Pluto’s face. “Olympus will fall.” He said again. “And… even if it didn’t…” 

He looked down at Peter. “He loved me.” The sound of that word in the past tense broke his heart. “I could be reborn a beggar a thousand times over and it would be worth it for a moment more of his love.” 

Pluto sighed and reached over as if to comfort him and Juno almost smacked his hand away when it came to close to Peter. “Is he worth it?” 

Is he  **worth** it? 

He did smack his hand away, staking a step back. His face is dark with fury. “Worth it?” He repeated. “You… you dare?” He drew Peter closer to his chest. “He… he’s everything.” Pluto looked shocked, staring at him. “He loved me.” Juno repeated. “I love him. I never thought, I never thought….” He wished he could cry. “Do you not know what I would give to have him back? To be breathing again, to hear his voice?” Juno laughed hysterically. “My throne, my divinity, my immortality?” He spat. “Have them. Rip them out of me, make me  **bleed** with it Pluto.” 

Juno stared at him. “Just let me be with him again.  **_Please_ ** .” 

He’s so cold. He wished he could turn to stone, wished his body could lie down next to Peter’s, that he could stare at him until he saw nothing at all and they could be entombed, still embraced and never to part. 

But that isn’t to be. Pluto tried to pass him his crown back, tried to place it back on his head but Juno turned it away. “I’m not his queen anymore.” Juno said, lips numb. “Take it. Make it new.” He never wanted to see it again. “If he asks you can tell him that.” 

Pluto’s eyes were sad, his hands still holding the crown. “What can I do?” 

Juno blinked slowly. “What will I get you?” He asked, morbidly curious. “The divinity of a goddess? The Crown of the Heavens, my throne for your wife.” His lips quirked up. “What are my riches worth to you?” There is only one thing he wanted. “I’d get the last one quick. I don’t know how long the palace will continue to stand.” 

The answer didn’t seem to satisfy him and Juno let out a long breath like a sigh. “He said he would find me. Again and again.” He didn’t look away from Peter’s face. “I want to find him. I want to see him. Like… like the humans. Before.” 

His hand brushed a stray curl away from Peter’s face. 

“Let us find each other. Always find each other. Until we are whole again.” 

Pluto was silent for a long time. “That may never come. You would set yourself to wander the universe forever? Seeking a completeness that might never be achieved?” There is something in his eyes, like he wanted to ask him to reconsider. “Your soul would never know rest from life.”

He nodded slowly. “All I want,” Juno said, voice far away “is him. No matter how many lives, how far we go from here… Him. Always him.” Juno slowly turned away from the balcony. “Can you give me that?” 

“Yes. I can.”

* * *

 

The riverbanks of the Lethe sloped gently. The river itself was wide and Juno saw ghostly souls lingering on either side. Some dove in, others lingered moving closer to the edge with hesitant steps and others did not come down at all but all stared at the clear dark waters, their mouths parched with thirst. 

Pluto pointed in the direction that the river flowed. “I do not know what the waters will do to you. You will forget, be reborn but…” He sighed, the question of whether or not he was sure lingering on his lips. 

Juno was glad that he refrained from asking. 

“Your body will,” Pluto stopped a moment. “Only souls remain by the time you reach the end. I can not say what will happen to your angel. His kind is not meant for this afterlife but… He has followed you this far.” 

Juno nodded and stepped down. One step, then another as he approached the water. The water was warm as it encircled his feet, his ankles and higher. It felt strange but it did not penetrate the cold that had swallowed him. Peter’s wings absorbed the water as Juno walked deeper into the river. His waist, Peter’s dangling legs, his arms. He was up to his shoulders when the current began pulling at him. 

He lifted his feet, pushed off the bottom and his arms tightened around Peter as his head was pulled beneath the waters.

The surface is a dream and Juno kicked, propelling himself forward. He breathed in and the water burned as it ran through him. He has no need of oxygen and the water is cleansing, purging and there is no choice but to take it in if he wants to reach the end. 

His eyes burn as he opened them but in the rushing water he can see Peter’s face, the force of the water opening his mouth. He can’t breathe it in but neither can the ghosts. 

Juno pulled in another lungful of water and the burning starts. His mind felt foggy but he kept kicking forward. Another breath and the light above them changed but he doesn’t remember why. 

There are flashes. 

> A golden palace and a golden man with a voice like the storm. 
> 
> A wedding, a wedding night. 
> 
> The children with golden faces and the names of different women. Another nymph, another mortal in the bed that is supposed to be his. 
> 
> A woman and a hearth, the feeling of gentle hands carding through his hair, letting him rest his head on her breast until the pain ebbed. 
> 
> Anger. So much anger. 
> 
> Curses, death, revenge that never soothes the hurt inside him every time he wakes up to an empty bed. 

All of it begins to blur and fade away like footprints in sand being washed away by the tide. He gritted his teeth and kept swimming. Juno didn’t remember why but he had to keep swimming forward, had to keep holding on to the motionless man in his arms. 

He breathed in more water and feels it start to wear away at more of him. 

> Stars at his fingertips, the heat of the forges that galaxies are born in. 
> 
> His name whispered in prayer and supplication. ‘Grant us protection oh Juno protector of women and mothers’ 
> 
> Blessings on the marriage bed, the flush of youth in a soldier’s face as he marched into battle, Rome laid out before him, the Empire laid out before him as statues are built in his image, his face imprinted on coin. ‘Juno Regina’, ‘Juno Capitolina’, ‘Juno of the Aventine’. 
> 
> Walking the halls of his Temple. 
> 
> “They really haven’t captured your beauty properly.” Turning his head and the whisper of wings. A vulpine smile and dark eyes.

No. His eyes pop open and he almost choked, trying to stop what was already fading. No, no he was… he was…. He gasped, taking in more water. He couldn’t forget that but he couldn’t remember what he was afraid of losing. It was… it was important. He couldn’t remember why it was important but it was. 

His body felt strange. Heavier but lighter at the same time. If he could look at himself he would have seen his body begin to melt away, the river dissolving divine flesh to leave the soul behind. 

Peter… his name was Peter’s wings were gone, the faint memory of feathers the only evidence that they had ever been there. He was warmer now, the cold that had reached so deep in Juno’s bones transforming to a strange lightness but the body in his arms is more than that. 

Something tells him to just let go.

Swimming would be easier with his arms free but the thought is met with a scream deep inside him and he clings to the body, to Peter  **_his name is Peter_ ** tighter. 

His lungs burn and despite his best efforts he had to breath the water again. He kicked harder, he had to be getting close to the end. The less of the water he takes in the… better… He can’t forget… he can’t forget. 

> The angel comes again. 
> 
> There is a new God in the Empire and Juno barely paid attention but the angel, the angel called himself Peter and Juno paid attention to him. 
> 
> It isn’t proper. He knows it is not proper for him to entertain this angel on his own but Ju-He has no interest in him. He is left alone and the angel, Peter becomes his companion. He sits beside the throne as Juno reads petitions, feeds the peacocks that gather in Juno’s garden from his hands and grooms his own feathers while Juno watches and spins. 
> 
> He looked at Juno like he wanted him.
> 
> It makes him feel powerful. Desired. 
> 
> Telling himself that watching Peter when he visits isn’t wrong. It's only looking and he is only a temporary fascination for the angel. Nothing can come of it, nothing will come of it so what would looking, what would  _ thinking  _ hurt? 
> 
> A first kiss that is like falling. 
> 
> Silk.
> 
> He can’t touch silk after that, holds it to his face with the memory of the kiss and the spinning feeling of being cast free of one gravity well and into another orbit. 
> 
> Another kiss and Peter kneeling before him on the kline and discovering a new heaven between his thighs. The bite of teeth in a kiss and  **_returning the favor_ ** without wondering whose mouth, whose hands were there just hours before. 
> 
> An angel’s voice singing his name like a hymn, the knowledge that all of it, all of it is for him and him alone. 
> 
> That first soft ‘I love you’ whispered in a golden moment, Juno’s head resting on his chest. 

Faded, faded, faded. 

He screamed and the water took more from him. Names, faces blurring into fog. His life before is a mist and he is running through it, unaware of whatever cliff is waiting for him but he kept swimming, had to keep swimming for the light but he doesn’t know why anymore. 

His arms, does he have arms are full and swimming is so hard but he can’t let go, he can’t let go. His legs kick again and again but they are weaker now but the light is so close. 

The weight disappeared and he opened his eyes, reached out to try and catch it but there is nothing to catch. 

A face is looking back at him. He does not know it, he should know it but he does not know his own name anymore. The face smiled and his heart ached as he reached back and took his hand, pulling him close. 

He breathed in and the other pulled him close, lips brushing against his. 

_ Silk. _

> Peter. 

“ **_I will always come back to you Juno. No matter what”_ **

The river spilled over and everything is light and everything is… everything is all over again. They begin again. 

His name is Juno.


End file.
